I am about to return the above books to the library.
I love my library in Oswestry. The librarians are lovely and supportive and they run many different activities for different ages and groups. It is warm, colourful and friendly environment. It not only houses a wonderful collection of books and papers but it provides access to the internet and offers free classes for anyone who requires assistance in improving their computer literacy. I have to broadcast how wonderful it is because ‘trickle down wealth’, which was promised by the current government has not eventuated (its stuck to fingers of the already excruciatingly rich), and this means the local government bodies are pinched for cash. They are having to make very difficult decisions re allocation of money and they are cutting services. So our wonderful, wonderful library is struggling to provide those services that our community appreciates and needs.
The library has an extensive science-fiction and fantasy section. This is one of the places that I find new authors or finish a series by a tried and familiar favourite author. The librarians will search thorough the resources of linked libraries for authors I am seeking and I can order the book delivered for a pound. I do buy science fiction when I have found a gem of a story or a great author. I decided not to buy anymore of Robin Hobb’s, The Rain Wild Chronicles,
though I own the first two because I thought that the series was getting very tired and predictable. The passion and vivacity of the characters and the environment we were introduced to in The Dragon Keeper became humdrum and repetitive. I do think that Hobb needed to write less voluminously to write more. I think that she would have done well to have compressed the last two books into one. I am convinced that this sort of epic writing can be a trap for an author leading him/her to sacrifice imagination and talent in order to exploit the popularity created by the first book. I am now not sure I will read another Robin Hobb I was so disappointed with the end of the series .
Stephen Deas has the opposite problem with The Thief-Taker’s Apprentice in that this book seems to have been bundled off the laptop with little revision and gaping holes in the development of character and environment. Deas is an evocative writer and there are some powerful moments as Berren, a criminal and a slum kid, chooses learning over continuing his pick-pocket career in a brutal city. I really disliked the way that the author used Lilissa in the novel. Master Sy was so enigmatic that I lost interest in the puzzle. I think there is a suggestion of a sequel but I am not interested enough to follow it up.
wenlowdwhispers 